Hawaiian Sovereignty Unanimously Recognized by the Libertarian National Committee
- Abbra Green
- 1 day ago
- 2 min read
At the July 5th, 2026 Libertarian National Committee (LNC) meeting, the Resolution on Tribal and National Sovereignty was unanimously adopted. The committee acknowledged the inherent sovereignty of Native American tribal nations and the Hawaiian Kingdom, and affirmed that their sovereignty predates and supersedes the jurisdictional frameworks imposed by the United States government. It made clear the Hawaiian Kingdom's claim outranks what was placed over it in 1893.
Hawaiian Sovereignty
“the Libertarian National Committee formally acknowledges the inherent sovereignty of Native American tribal nations and the Hawaiian Kingdom and affirms that their sovereignty predates and supersedes jurisdictional frameworks imposed by the United States government”
For a party whose backbone is the non-aggression principle, that is the only honest position available. The overthrow was carried out with the help of foreign troops. Force does not create a legitimate title. The resolution grounds that claim in the federal government's own admission. Public Law 103-150, the 1993 “Apology Resolution”, is the official acknowledgement from Congress that the 1893 overthrow was illegal and that the Hawaiian Kingdom never relinquished its claims to sovereignty. The LNC resolution merely takes the United States at its own word.
The Drafting Process
This is a product of careful work. Region 9 Representative Alex Flores noticed the resolution and then revised it in the open, folding in suggestions from other members between the first draft on June 29th and the workshopped version the next day. The revision added the Treaty of 1852 with the Apache nations, the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act of 1971, and the Supreme Court's ruling in Alaska v. Native Village of Venetie (1998), drawing a single throughline.
Treaty, corporate settlement, tribal recognition, every framework the federal government has tried has failed to deliver genuine self-determination to any of these underrepresented peoples. We are grateful to Representative Flores and to everyone who contributed to the language.
We are not the only ones who recognize the principle here. The Arizona Libertarian Party platform already states that it recognizes the sovereignty of indigenous people and rejects interference in their affairs from every level of government. That conviction traveling from a single affiliate's platform into a unanimous national resolution is exactly how a party's principles are supposed to mature. This resolution upholds sovereignty, something libertarians across the country already hold.
Mahalo from The Libertarian Party of Hawaii
The resolution closes by asking Libertarians to explore how best to empower these nations to reclaim their independence. For most of the committee that is a principled aspiration, but for us it is home ground. We intend to take the charge seriously and to be a resource to the Party on the topic of Hawaiians specifically.
The overthrow was illegal. The Kingdom never surrendered its sovereignty. Congress admitted it more than thirty years ago. The Libertarian National Committee has now said it too, in unanimous agreement. We are grateful for that, and we are ready to do the work that flows from it.
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